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DECISION

Promulgating a number of mechanisms and policies to support socio-economic development in Northern and Coastal Central provinces till 2010

THE PRIME MINISTER

Pursuant to the December 25, 2001 Law on Organization of the Government;

At the proposal of the Minister of Planning and Investment in Report No. 8409/TTr-BKH of November 15, 2007,

DECIDES:

Article 1.- To promulgate a number of mechanisms and policies to support socio-economic development in northern and coastal central provinces till 2010 (including coastal provinces and cities from Thanh Hoa to Binh Thuan), with the following principal contents:

1. A number of major objectives and norm of the region:

- The average GDP growth rate will be 10-11% per year;

- The total export turnover will reach more than USD 5 billion, with an average increase of 22-23% per year;

- To create jobs for around 2.5-3 million people;

- The rate of trained laborers will be around 30-35%;

- To reduce the rate of poor households to below 12% (according to the new poverty line);

- The rate of clean-water users will be 95% in urban areas and 75% in rural areas;

- To raise forest coverage to 44-45% of natural land; to improve the biological environment and assure sustainable development.

2. Key tasks on development of some major branches and domains:

a/ Industries:

To prioritize investment in the development of a number of major industries such as processing of agricultural, forestry and fishery products; construction materials; textile and garment; leather and shoes; steel refining and rolling; mechanical engineering; building seagoing vessels of large tonnage; oil refinery and petrochemistry; pulp and paper, etc.

To concentrate investment on a number of key projects during 2006-2010 such as those on upgrading and building agricultural, forestry and fishery product-processing plants; expanding existing cement plants and building some cement plants of an annual output of 1.4 million tons each; building Vung Ang thermopower plant of 1,200 MW, exploiting iron ores in Thach Khe and building steel-refining and -rolling mills in Vung Ang and Dung Quat, oil refinery plants in Dung Quat and Nghi Son and a pulp and paper plant in Thanh Hoa province, etc.

Provinces and cities shall further review and supplement plannings, mobilize capital sources for investment in the construction of infrastructure in existing economic zones and industrial parks and develop a number of necessary industrial clusters in order to create conditions for enterprises to speed up investment in projects in the region.

b/ Services:

To supplement plannings and invest in the construction of commercial service establishments such as the system of modern and civilized trade centers, exhibition-trade fair centers and supermarkets from provinces, districts to commune clusters; to develop a network of marketplaces in rural, mountainous and coastal areas and islands so as to facilitate goods sale, purchase and exchange by ethnic minority people in areas meeting with exceptional difficulties.

To develop border-gate economic zones in association the traffic systems along the border line; to prioritize investment in Lao Bao special trade-economic zone in order to expand commercial exchange, develop tourism and services with regional countries.

To make further investment to expand production scope and raise the quality of key export items of the region, including marine and aquatic products, manioc starch, tea, coffee, wood furniture, textiles and garments, construction materials and minerals, in order to meet criteria for export into regional and world markets.

To make investment to improve the capacity of passenger and cargo transport by land, railway, sea and air; to develop service establishments in the finance, banking, post and telecommunications, and information technology domains in a synchronous and modern manner; to develop information technology into a spearhead industry of the region.

To develop tourism on the basis of exploiting potentials and advantages of the region such as sea tourism, resort tourism, natural heritages and historical and cultural relics; to prioritize investment in the development of tourism along the East-West corridor and take part in tourism development in the Mekong River sub-region.

c/ Agriculture, forestry and fishery:

- Agriculture: Localities shall continue studying agricultural development toward commodity production, raising the efficiency per hectare of cultivated land, diversifying crops, assuring production safety, preventing and controlling natural disasters, stabilizing the rice-growing land area of 1.2 million hectares, developing large-scale areas under short-term industrial plants such as sugarcane, groundnut and tobacco or perennial industrial trees such as cashew, coffee, coconut, rubber, tea, pepper and fruit trees, and giving priority to agricultural production to supply raw materials for processing plants.

To concentrate on building the irrigation works of Cua Dat, Ban Mong, Ngan Truoi, Song Nghen, Ta Trach, Rao Quan and Dinh Binh.

To develop husbandry in farms and households, paying attention to large-scale rearing of beef, lean pig, goat and sheep in provinces where conditions permit.

- Forestry: To further adjust plannings on special-use forests, protective forests and economic forests. To partially allocate special-use forests and protective forests to households or communities for management. To combine regular forest planting, protection and tending activities with the program on planting five million hectares of forests in order to contribute to production restructuring, increase the number of export items and generate incomes so as to secure the livelihood of people engaged in forestry. To continue protecting, zoning and restoring nature reserves, national parks, submerged forests and headwater and coastal protective forests and consolidating the system of headwater protective forests, especially in high-slope areas where forests have been destroyed so as to step by step reduce damage caused by natural disasters. Annually, to plant about 70,000 hectares of forests, mainly protective forests, wind- and sand-shielding forests and anti-erosion forests in coastal areas. To continue allocating land and forests to people and enterprises for management and encouraging and supporting people who plant raw-material forests in combination with the development of forestry, agriculture and farm economy.

- Fishery and salt-making: To strive for a long-term objective of developing the fishery industry into a spearhead economic sector of central coastal provinces; during 2006-2010, to make concentrated investment in three major services of daily-life activities and raw material supply for exports production: stabilizing aquaculture and fishing activities while protecting the environment, rationally exploiting coastal plains, lagoons and islands; developing modern offshore fishing fleets in order to combine fishing activities with protection of security and territorial water security; and further investing in the construction of fish harbors, fishery logistic service centers and ships' storm shelters.

To quickly increase salt output for consumption, industrial production and export, concentrating on building and expanding a number of salt-fields in localities on the basis of local plannings, demands and investment capability.

d/ Education, healthcare, culture and environmental protection:

- Education and training: To elaborate a planning on the network of schools of various levels, including boarding schools for ethnic minority pupils in mountainous and highland districts and commune clusters, ensuring that each commune will have one primary school and one lower secondary school, each village will have primary classes and pre-school classes, each commune cluster will have one semi-boarding lower secondary school and each district or provincial city will have two or more upper secondary schools.

To invest in the system of provincial- and district-level vocational training schools while encouraging the establishment of people-founded and private vocational training schools so that by 2010, all provinces, cities, districts and provincial capitals will have general vocational-training schools. To build a number of professional secondary schools and hi-tech job-training centers according to plannings in order to train technical workers for economic zones and industrial parks.

- Healthcare: Localities shall continue implementing the Prime Minister's Decision No. 225/2005/QD-TTg of September 15, 2005, on upgrading of district hospitals and regional general hospitals during 2006-2010, ensuring that by 2010, each district will have one grade-I general hospital of between 100-200 patient beds. To build regional hospitals of 600-700 patient beds in Vinh, Hue, Da Nang, Quy Nhon and Nha Trang, consolidate and develop existing provincial obstetric, pediatric, psychiatric and traditional medicine hospitals. To ensure that communes will have health stations up to national standards, which are equipped with devices as prescribed and have physicians to provide medical examination and treatment to people.

- Culture and information: To accelerate the building of material foundations while improving the quality of culture and information activities. In the near future, it is necessary to organize culture and information activities at the grassroots and enhance the communication and education of the Party's lines, undertakings and policies and the State's laws to all people in coastal areas, islands and mountainous, deep-lying and remote areas. To enhance television and radio broadcasting activities, ensuring that by 2010, all communes and households in the region can watch television and listen to the Voice of Vietnam Radio.

To make synchronous investment in culture and information establishments at all levels, prioritizing community cultural activities in villages, hamlets and communes; to protect and embellish historical and cultural relics and beauty spots, combining conservation with creation of tourist sites and improvement of material foundations for cultural activities of local inhabitants.

- To further build technical-material foundations for sports and physical training, ensuring that by 2010, each province will have at least three essential provincial-level facilities, namely a stadium, a swimming pool and a gymnasium, in service of the development of professional and high-achievement sports as well as mass sport movements, focusing on sports of mass favorite such as football, swimming, track and field and traditional martial arts.

- Science, technology and environment:

To implement four state scientific and technological programs (biotechnology, information technology, new-materials technology and automation) in production, business, service and management activities. To build and develop the region's science and technology personnel. To train and promote the role of managers, scientists, technologists and skilled workers. To accelerate research, training and communication activities; and to expand models of economic villages and agricultural production and handicraft models.

To manage, exploit and rationally use natural resources and landscapes and protect the bio-environment. To adopt uniform policies and measures to tackle environmental pollution in an active and effective manner.

e/ Synchronously developing the region's infrastructure:

To elaborate plannings on the system of infrastructure, ensuring the region's socio-economic development. To further invest in the construction of seaports, airports, road and railway systems and irrigation-cum-hydropower works and the consolidation of existing works; to develop rural and urban water supply and drainage systems; to develop a network of urban centers under the Prime Minister's Decision No. 148/2004/QD-TTg on major orientations for socio-economic development in the central key economic region up to 2010 and the 2020 vision; Decision No. 113/2005/QD-TTg of May 20, 2005, promulgating the Government's program of action for the implementation of the Political Bureau's Resolution No. 39/NQ-TW and other relevant decisions.

To develop economic zones and big urban centers into regional development centers, building Vinh city into an economic and cultural center of the northern Central Vietnam, Da Nang city into a large soco-economic center of Central Vietnam and Dung Quat, Chu Lai, Nhon Hoi, Van Phong, Chan May-Lang Co, Vung Ang, southeastern Nghe An and Nghi Son economic zones into multi-purposed economic zones; to build Lao Bao special trade-economic zone under the planning approved by the Prime Minister.

f/ Defense and security:

Localities in the region shall coordinate with the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of Public Security in building infrastructure such as ships' storm shelters, ports and fishery logistics service centers, coastal roads, sea route and airway search and rescue centers, border stations and border-patrol roads in island districts and communes and border communes in order to meet defense and security requirements and serve economic activities; to stabilize and arrange population clusters in association with border posts and build defense economic zones in strategic geographical areas. To accelerate the mass movement of Fatherland protection, form a posture of all-people security in close association with the all-people defense and build firm defensive areas in each province or city. To effectively prevent and fight crimes and social evils.

Article 2.- To continue implementing and supplementing mechanisms, policies and solutions for socio-economic development and defense and security maintenance in the region

1. To continue implementing current mechanisms and policies to fulfill major objectives and tasks of the region, including:

- The Prime Minister's Decision No. 150/2005/QD-TTg of June 20, 2005, approving the planning on restructuring the national agricultural, forestry and fishery production up to 2010, with a 2020 vision;

- The policies on production-land, residential-land, dwelling-house and daily-life water supports for ethnic minority people under the Prime Minister's Decision No. 134/2004/QD-TTg of July 20, 2004. Localities shall make review so as to ensure that supports will be provided to proper subjects in a public and transparent manner; to strive to complete the work by 2008;

- The policies on supply of essential items as support for ethnic minority people in difficulty-hit areas under the Government's Decree No. 20/1998/ND-CP of March 31, 1998, and Decree No. 02/2002/ND-CP of January 3, 2002. To review and adjust the provision of support by empowering local administrations to take the initiative in selecting eligible subjects and strictly managing the supply of goods to users;

- The policies on provision of preferential credit via the Social Policy Bank and other micro credit institutions to poor households, social policy beneficiaries and production and business households in mountainous and coastal areas and islands, which are collectively referred to as difficulty-hit areas and exceptional difficulty-hit areas;

- The Government's Decree No. 134/2006/ND-CP of November 14, 2006, providing for the regime of enrolment by nomination mode into universities, colleges and secondary schools belonging to the national education system. To train and re-train state management officials at various levels, especially the grassroots level;

Branches, provinces, districts and communes shall work out plans on training, re-training and employment of state management officials. To give priority to the employment of ethnic minority graduates who return to localities and take part in local socio-economic development.

- The policies on provision of medical examination and treatment to the poor and social policy beneficiaries under the Prime Minister's Decision No. 139/2002/QD-TTg of October 15, 2002.

2. To amend and supplement the following mechanisms and policies:

a/ Policies on agricultural, forestry and fishery production and rural development:

- To permit the application of the Prime Minister's Decision No. 231/2005/QD-TTg of September 22, 2005, on provision of support to state-owned agricultural and forestry enterprises and management boards of special-use forests and protective forests, that employ ethnic minority laborers, to western districts of northern and coastal central provinces;

- To permit the application of the Prime Minister's Decision No. 304/2005/QD-TTg of November 23, 2005, on the pilot assignment of forests and contractual assignment of forests for protection to households and communities in ethnic minority villages to western districts of northern central and central coastal provinces;

- For free migrants who are living in special-use forests, protective forests and national parks, localities should relocate them in residential areas where exists production land or where it is possible to develop other trade lines or elaborate projects on compulsory resettlement under the Prime Minister's Decision No. 193/2006/QD-TTg of August 24, 2006, approving the program on population distribution in areas frequented by natural disasters, exceptional difficulty-hit areas, border areas, islands, areas inhabited by free migrants, important and very important zones of protective forests and strictly protected zones of special-use forests during 2006-2010 and orientations towards 2015.

b/ Policies towards difficulty-hit areas and ethnic minority areas:

- To encourage enterprises to employ and train laborers by themselves. Particularly, those engaged in industrial tree planting, afforestation and aquaculture will be provided by the State funding amounts equal to job-training funds for them to organize training courses for new recruits;

- Poor ethnic minority pupils who are entitled to study at boarding schools but study at public or semi-public schools will be granted a scholarship equal to 50% of the scholarship for boarding pupils;

- Graduates from ethnic minority boarding schools will be given priority in enrolment by nomination mode into universities, pre-universities and professional schools in order to reinforce the contingent of grassroots officials, if they do not study at professional schools, they may take part in professional or technical training courses of three, six or nine months in conformity with practical requirements and be arranged to work in localities. The training will be carried out at vocational-training centers in provinces or districts with funds allocated by the State;

- Policies on employment and preferential treatment of officials working in mountainous and ethnic minority areas: Provinces shall make plannings and plans on training and reinforcing officials for districts and communes. In order to attract graduates from professional schools to work in mountainous areas, islands and deep-lying and remote areas, especially in communes, provinces shall work out their employment plans and coordinate with the Ministry of Home Affairs in proposing policies on employment and training of officials in legal knowledge, state administration skills, economic management operations, agitation skills and information technology so that they will assist commune- and district-level authorities in socio-economic development and order and security maintenance;

- To adjust the limits on common medicines and medical consumable supplies applicable to commune health stations, increase the allowance levels for pre-school teachers and village health workers to 50% of the base wage level. To provide support in terms of meal, accommodation and travel expenses for in-patients (who are treated at hospitals of district or higher levels).

c/ Investment support policies:

- To raise the level of support of at most VND 70 billion from the central budget for investment in industrial parks in localities satisfying criteria set in the Prime Minister's Decision No. 183/2004/QD-TTg of October 19, 2004 (including feeding roads or roads and bridges leading to industrial parks);

- To provide a support amount of at most VND 70 billion from the central budget for the construction of infrastructure in the second industrial park selected by localities, for localities satisfying criteria set in the Prime Minister's Decision No. 183/2004/QD-TTg of October 19, 2004;

- The State shall partially provide capital for construction of facilities for natural disaster prevention and combat such as dikes, breakwaters and storm shelters as well as the consolidation of dwelling houses and construction of shelter trenches in coastal residential areas.

3. Investment solutions:

a/ Mobilization and use of investment capital:

In order to implement orientations, mechanisms, policies and solutions for socio-economic development in the northern and coastal Central Vietnam up to 2010, it is necessary to mobilize all development investment capital sources from various economic sectors in the region:

- State budget capital (including ODA capital);

- Investment credit capital;

- Capital of state enterprises;

- Capital of non-state enterprises and population;

- Foreign-invested capital;

- Other lawful capital sources.

State budget capital will be prioritized for investment in infrastructure (completion of works under construction; maintenance and repair of built infrastructures and building of new facilities according to plannings). Ministries, branches and localities are requested to make appropriate plans and intensive investment so as to ensure the schedule and effectiveness of invested works, especially reservoirs, water supply and drainage systems, small-sized irrigation works and motor roads to communes.

Concerned ministries, branches, groups, corporations, enterprises and localities should adopt mechanisms to mobilize capital from economic sectors inside and outside the region for investment in production, business and service activities and socio-economic infrastructures in the northern and coastal Central Vietnam.

Banks shall create favorable conditions for enterprises of all economic sectors and inhabitants in the region to borrow capital for investment in production and business activities, especially preferential loans for investment in the development of the region's processing industry.

b/ Plan on allocation and use of resources: On the basis of development orientations and the 2006-2010 five-year plan, each locality and branch shall work out its annual investment plans as prescribed in the Prime Minister's Decision No. 210/2006/QD-TTg of September 12, 2006, promulgating principles, criteria and limits on allocation of development investment with state budget in the 2007-2010 period.

Article 3.- Organization of implementation

1. Ministries, ministerial-level agencies and provincial/municipal People's Committees in the Region shall coordinate with one another in scrutinizing, supplementing and adjusting branch plannings and master plannings on socio-economic development in conformity with the new situation; formulate 2006-2010 five-year plans and annual plans; determine a list of five-year investment programs and projects and annual plans; and supervise development investment according to plannings.

2. Ministries, branches, provinces and cities shall complete the elaboration of their action programs according to tasks assigned in the Prime Minister's Decision No. 113/2005/QD-TTg on the program for the implementation of the Political Bureau's Resolution No. 39/NQ-TW; set up steering committees and assign leaders in charge of the implementation of these programs and projects; study, elaborate and submit to the Prime Minister mechanisms and policies to mobilize sources for the achievement of set objectives; enhance the inspection and urge the implementation of these programs and projects.

3. Biannually and annually, ministries, branches and People's Committees of northern and coastal central provinces shall report on the implementation of this Decision to the Ministry of Planning and Investment for summing up and reporting to the Prime Minister.

4. Annually, the Ministry of Planning and Investment shall assume the prime responsibility for, and coordinate with concerned ministries, branches and localities in, conducting preliminary and final review for reporting to the Prime Minister.

Article 4.- This Decision takes effect 15 days after its publication in "CONG BAO."

Article 5.- Presidents of People's Committees of provinces and centrally run cities in northern and coastal Central Vietnam, ministers, heads of ministerial-level agencies, and heads of government-attached agencies shall implement this Decision.